eBRAIN Training
T32 Training Grant
Population Neuroscience of Aging, Alzheimer’s Disease and
Age-related Dementia (PNA)
Our Vision
To understand the causes and mechanisms of ADRD, population neuroscientists of the future must be able to link environmental exposures, lifestyles, comorbidities, and genomics with knowledge of modern technology of neurosciences and measurements of brain disease and data science.
Competencies of PNA
PNA trainees integrate key concepts in population science, neuroscience, gerontology, and data science to:
- obtain in-depth knowledge of the complex inter-relationships between the factors contributing to ADRD, and the effect of multi-morbidities accompanying aging;
- develop and apply skills in study design, data collection/ analysis and methodologies to measure CNS in vulnerable populations, including minorities and women, as early as middle-age;
- understand the demographic and health characteristics of at-risk populations vary in relation to the setting (e.g. community, specific neighborhoods, research clinic) and modify study designs accordingly;
- appreciate the changes that new technologies can bring to study designs and how to use such technological advances for novel research questions.
- upgrade data collection and study design methods in their projects, to keep up with technological advancements;
- become fluent in communicating effectively with colleagues trained according to discipline norms, while also reaching beyond traditional boundaries.
PNA Curriculum
Available Datasets
Trainee Milestones
Mentors
Expectations of mentors and co-mentors
- Time availability for regular individual meetings to establish goals, review progress and milestone accomplishments.
- Make the trainee aware of their expectations and maintain open communications with their trainee.
- Evaluate the trainee’s strengths and deficiencies and provide opportunities to build skills in needed areas.
- Provide resources to accomplish agreed upon goals: laboratory support, data for testing of novel hypotheses, generating preliminary results for grants, funds for traveling if needed, additional funds for data collections
- Provide opportunities for co-authorship of papers.
- Assist with public presentations and publishing first-authored papers.
- Provide field experience on active research studies.
- Facilitate networking locally, nationally and internationally (e.g. at conferences and remotely).
- Assist trainees with submitting pilot proposals.
- Provide guidance with the independent research project.
- Provide opportunities to do ad hoc journal reviews.
- Education & Training | CTSI University of Pittsburgh
Prior Trainees
Summary of accomplishments of PNA trainees with >1 year in training
Meet Our Students
2024-2025 PNA Epidemiology Trainees
T-Shirt Motto
We asked our T32 Trainees to give us their t-shirt motto – two short sentences answering these questions…
What have you discovered so far?
What do you want to discover?
Erica Fan
pre-doctoral trainee
primary faculty mentor: Dr. Rosso
What have you discovered so far?
My recent work has focused on how census-level measures of deprivation may affect the relationship between neurodegenerative biomarkers and cognitive function. Broadly, we have found that these neighborhood/community-level factors alter the relationship between pathology found on brain imaging and cognition in at-risk groups, challenging the generalizability of current frameworks of Alzheimer’s disease.
What do you want to discover?
I am excited to uncover more about how the way we live and interact with our communities affects our cognitive health longitudinally. I am especially looking forward to learning and developing new ways to model longitudinal community-level effects on complex individual physiology, incorporating cardiovascular and neurodegenerative biomarker data.
What have you discovered so far?
My recent work has focused on examining the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on people with multiple sclerosis, investigating how the social networks of people with multiple sclerosis and control participants changed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and understanding how comprehensive assessment of environmental factors can predict neurological disability in people with multiple sclerosis.
What do you want to discover?
I’m excited to develop novel clinical informatics and analytical approaches that will enable us to derive important insights from the rapidly growing healthcare data sources with a focus on neurodegenerative diseases.
Richard Xu, ScM
pre-doctoral trainee
primary faculty mentor: Dr. Rosano
Current position: Second year PhD student, Department of Epidemiology
Academic interest: I am interested in leveraging existing large cohorts such as MESA and All of Us and integrate multi-omics data (genome, epigenome, metabolome, proteome) with socio-environmental exposures, lifestyles, and nutrition to develop and apply advanced statistical methods, AI, and machine learning in PNA research.
Fun fact: I also have a twin brother doing his PhD in epidemiology.
What have you discovered so far?
During my master program in biostatistics, my research focused on the interplay of smoking and one-carbon micronutrients on DNA methylation. I found that maternal folate supplementation was able to attenuate the adverse effects of smoking on cord blood DNA methylation, specifically aryl hydrocarbon receptor repressor (cg05575921), which has been previously linked to a range of pediatric and adult diseases. This project was selected as a platform presentation at the 2022 American Public Health Association annual meeting under the genome forum and received a student award. This work led to my first authored publication in a top nutritional journal (Xu R et al, J Nutr. 2023; PMCID: PMC10447613).
What do you want to discover?
Meredith Phillips
post-doctoral trainee
primary faculty mentor: Dr. Rosso
Current position: Graduate student in Neuroscience, MD-PhD candidate at University of Pittsburgh
Academic interest: Social and life history risk factors for cognitive impairment and decline
Fun fact: I lived at a summer camp growing up
What have you discovered so far?
The association between having and raising children and cognitive function/decline differs by setting
What do you want to discover?
Elana Gloger
post-doctoral trainee
primary faculty mentor: Dr. Catov
Current position: PNA T32 Postdoctoral Scholar, Department of Epidemiology at University of Pittsburgh
Academic interest: My research integrates longitudinal, mechanistic models of psychosocial, cognitive, biological, and immunological changes during midlife to better understand the rate and magnitude of accelerated aging when risk factors for poor aging may still be modifiable. I’m especially interested in how psychological stress during midlife contributes to accelerated aging as well as the cardiovascular and neurobiological factors that explain these effects
Fun fact: I have a crochet account on Etsy and create and sell baby blanket patterns in my free time. I am also a die-hard Cleveland Browns fan!
What have you discovered so far?
My recent work has focused on gender-specific effects of an inflammatory biomarker, interleukin-6 (IL-6) on cognitive aging. We found that older women’s visuomotor and processing speed was especially sensitive to heightened systemic inflammation as they aged. On the other side of the aging spectrum, I recently investigated the effect of Cytomegalovirus (CMV) on young adult’s daily stress processes. We found that young adults who are CMV+ may benefit from psychosocial interventions that increase their propensity to pursue goals and their sensitivity to reward. CMV+ participants reported more daily stress exposures and greater stressor severity (both of which are disadvantageous to health) only if they also indicated lower levels of trait goal pursuit and trait reward sensitivity.
What do you want to discover?
I want to establish midlife as a sensitive period of development and discover how to better study aging in midlife populations. Many current methodologies for tracking age-related changes don’t see significant changes until older adulthood, but meaningful biological, immunological, and neurological changes occur before then. Our choices, behaviors, and exposures during midlife determine how well we age through older adulthood – that is, how many years of healthy living we experience. But what specifically affects the rate of aging and why do some people age faster (i.e., decline faster) and start aging earlier in life than others? What is the “point of no return”? In other words, when is aging no longer modifiable? And how do cardiovascular, neurobiological, immunological, and psychological processes interact to explain how midlife aging impacts older adulthood? These are all questions I hope to pursue throughout my career.
Previous Students
Former PNA T32 Training Grant Trainees
Jermon Drake
Focus: My research aims to elucidate why certain racial/ethnic groups and those with lower levels of socioeconomic status are a greater risk of experiencing accelerated neurocognitive decline, and how modifiable lifestyle factors, especially physical activity, may reduce risk for Alzheimer’s disease.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Gianaros
Rebecca Ehrenkranz
Scientific Program Manager at the NIA’s Office of Clinical Research
Focus: exploring energy in aging populations across the following domains: cognition, mood, physical function, and physical activity. I have a bachelors degree from Brandeis University and an MPH from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In my spare time, I enjoy rock climbing (both indoor and outdoor).
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Rosano
Mary Gantz-Marker
Post-Doctoral Trainee
Focus: Neurodegenerative diseases, particularly Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy and Alzheimer’s Disease
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Rosano
Sara Godina
PhD Student, PI of R36 grant – The impact of the neighborhood environment on cognitively healthy life years and structural markers of brain health
Topic: identifying environmental risk factors for brain aging. I am particularly interested in reduction of health disparities in dementia, among Black and Hispanic older adults. My current projects involve examining the neural correlates underlying racial differences in cognitive impairment to clarify mechanisms.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Rosso
Thomas Kraynak
Postdoctoral Fellow, Epidemiology
Focus: My research focuses on brain-body pathways that link psychological stress and stress-related peripheral physiology with physical health and brain health. In addition, I am interested in leveraging machine learning approaches to reliably identify predictors of brain health throughout the life course. Finally, I am interested in applying noninvasive neuromodulation techniques to target and potentially modify brain circuits that may link stress to dementia risk.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Andreescu
Alina Lesnovskaya
Graduate student in the Clinical and Biological Health Psychology Program, School of Arts and Sciences, University of Pittsburgh
Focus: promoting healthy brain aging through accessible non-pharmacological interventions, such as exercise training. I am also interested in utilizing functional and structural neuroimaging to study individual differences in healthy and pathological aging.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Erickson
Maria Ly, MD, PhD
Post-doctoral Associate at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, University of Michigan
Topic: Utilization of multimodal imaging and machine learning models to; 1: identify early biomarkers or predictors of outcome in aging and Alzheimer’s disease and, 2: identify risk factors and resilience factors in aging and Alzheimer’s disease.
My thesis work is based on a machine-learning algorithm that predicts brain age, which may be a proxy for brain reserve.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Aizenstein
Beth Shabaan, PhD, MPH
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology, in the School of Public Health, University of Pittsburgh
Focus: vascular contributions to cognitive impairment and dementia (VCID). I am particularly interested in the interplay of cerebrovascular integrity and Alzheimer’s disease pathology in the development of clinically overt cognitive impairment and whether promotion of cerebral small vessel integrity can prevent cognitive impairment. A new line of my work involves sex and gender differences and sex and gender-specific risk in VCID / Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD).
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Klunk
Briana Sprague, PhD
Assistant Professor at University of Indiana
Topic: My research topic involves the relationship between complex physical functions (e.g., walking) and cognitive function (broadly, but primarily interested in processing speed) in older adulthood. In addition, I want to develop an understanding of how neurological mechanisms (e.g., dopamine) impact this relationship. Ultimately, I am interested in how we can leverage these factors to prevent or attenuate declines in physical, cognitive, and everyday function in older adulthood.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Rosano
Kailyn Witonsky
MD/PhD Student
Focus: I am interested in working on interdisciplinary teams applying data analytics to identify and understand modifiable factors in healthy aging that can eventually lead to clinical interventions for vulnerable populations.
Primary Faculty Mentor: Dr. Rosano
